


Fingon's Lament

by Fadesintothewest



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, M/M, Mental Anguish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-15
Updated: 2013-06-15
Packaged: 2017-12-15 01:22:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/843673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fadesintothewest/pseuds/Fadesintothewest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lament at Fingon's incremation breaks Maedhros.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fingon's Lament

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: The song verses are the English translation of an actual traditional Hungarian folk song," Szerelem, Szerelem", which means love, love. The lullaby itself is exactly Fingon’s lament in my mind. Hear it here interpreted by the brilliant Márta Sebestyén, Hungarian folk singer: http://youtu.be/YD02V5Lb2sY

The death lament tore at the depths of his soul. His anguish now greater than the torment he endured at _Thangorodrim_. The _Laegil_ song was strange to his ears, the melody haunting and searching. The voice searched his soul finding what he hid in the depths of that darkness.

 

_“O, love love_

_accursed torture_

_why did you not blossom_

_on every treetop?”_

 

Unlike the Noldorin laments of death, the _Laegelrim_ sang of love, of loss, of the fates of star-crossed lovers for death was an end to love. They did not sing of great deeds, of battles won, heroic ends.  The story told was of an elf, his love for life, his love for his family, his people, but a finite love. The story that reached Eru told of the heartache of love, a love extinguished by the cruelest of all that was the grace for the Second Born, now a torment for the Eldar. Death was a cruel lover that left no passage, no path to explore other desires and heartaches. An utterly devastating nothingness, he was no more.

 

_“On the top of every tree,_

_on the leaf of a walnut tree,_

_so every maiden and unmarried young man_

_would have plucked it.“_

 

The single ethereal voice graced the heavens, “Oh, love, love…” In his mind the words were perverse reminders of his fate, the fate his father, his family had brought upon his kin, upon him. Others around him cried out, their wailing terrifying and beautiful. They too loved him.

 

_“Because I too plucked it_

_and I let it slip away._

_I too plucked it_

_and I let it slip away.”_

 

The lament was born from the roots of _ennor_ , earthen and ephemeral, it reached into the very center of his body, slithering, climbing, suffocating him. A carnal lament, a lament born of blood and birth, not letting you turn to look away from his body burning upon the pyre. His body broken.  He envied the _Nandor_. They released their rage, their sorrow. He could only stand, feeling as if he too had been cloven into the earth. To see his beautiful face again in life, if only for a moment.

 

_O, I would pluck one again_

_if I found a good one,_

_if I found a good one, a beautiful one,_

_my old lover._

 

The Green elf was singing his lament. She was stealing his sorrow, exposing it for all gathered to know the depths of his love.

 

_“And for my old lover_

_what wouldn't I do for you?_

_I would skim the water_

_from the sea with a spoon.”_

 

Indeed it seemed life had stolen his love, played a cruel trick. For in a fit of uncharacteristic desire, months before the fall of the Valiant, he forged a delicate silver net in which he inlaid tiny pearls, a wreath of pearls made for his beloved. Into the wreath of silver and white he had poured beauty, love, and hope, those things in him that should not be in that darkness.  The last verse of the lament broke him. From deep within him came a sound so broken, so utterly sorrowful, it is said that the whole of _ennor_ mourned.

 

_“From the bottom of the sea_

_I would gather small pearls_

_and for my old lover_

_I would braid a wreath of pearls.”_

 

He had laid the wreath of pearls upon Fingon’s broken body before the fire took it and Maitimo’s love with it. 

**Author's Note:**

> Laegil- Green elf  
> Laegelrim- Green elves  
> Nandor- Green elves (quenya)  
> Ennor- middle earth


End file.
